


of love and other demons

by LizMikaelson, saltziepark



Category: Legacies (TV 2018)
Genre: F/F, hope is oblivious, jinns and nightmares and witches and other fun things, josie is exasperated, lizzie is in love, they're both dumb but cute, we're pretending they're all over eighteen because consent
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-01-27
Updated: 2021-01-22
Packaged: 2021-02-27 09:34:01
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 9,924
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22434970
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LizMikaelson/pseuds/LizMikaelson, https://archiveofourown.org/users/saltziepark/pseuds/saltziepark
Summary: hope returns from malivore and finds herself with a blind spot.a blonde haired, blue eyed, snarky, siphon-shaped blind spot.the kind of blind spot that's going to get her in trouble.
Relationships: Hope Mikaelson/Lizzie Saltzman
Comments: 52
Kudos: 373





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> please imagine that the cw is appropriate and they're all over eighteen.
> 
> [edit - january 2021 - updating with chapters and edits for content/clarity. enjoy!]

“The food in Malivore was better,” Hope mutters, holds up a single greasy fry, somehow raw and burnt at the same time. 

From across the cheap wooden table in the small-town diner, Alaric stares at her with wide, shocked eyes, completely lacking any idea of how to respond. 

“It was a joke,” Hope says, and goes back to her burger. 

Lizzie would have laughed, she thinks, a little randomly. Lizzie would have laughed and told her that no one likes a hero with an attitude, Mikaelson. 

Probably accompanied with a sarcastic eye roll. The snark and the eye roll would have hit Hope in the gut and even thinking about it, she's struck with a faint pang of sadness and something else. 

But Lizzie’s not here. 

It’s just her and Alaric, stuck in a tiny town in the middle of nowhere, looking for a monster that apparently has its sights set on men. Three of the town’s citizens had turned up dead in the last week. And those were the ones they knew about. There could be more. She really needed to cast a shielding charm around Alaric’s room, she thinks, biting into another soggy fry. 

They return to the motel and Alaric had thankfully given her a separate room. She bids him goodnight and mutters a quick protection spell over the door of his room after he goes inside, the Latin flowing out of her lips just the way Freya had taught her. They really couldn’t take their chances with whatever this monster was. It could be anything, really, and it seemed that men somehow fell prey easier than women. Or perhaps women weren’t even a part of the equation. 

With her head filled with random scenarios and plans for gathering additional information tomorrow morning from the local sheriff who looked like he was at his wit’s end, Hope rattles off a few texts to Josie. It was her roundabout way of inquiring about Lizzie and the state of the school in their absence without actually asking about Lizzie. She hopes the brunette siphon wouldn’t read too much into it. The text comes through and with it, Josie’s voice in Hope’s head. _You can always just text her, you know. Rather than going through me._

The three dots appear after Josie’s text and then disappear, only to reappear again. Hope holds her breath. _She’s fine. She may or may not be sulking because Dad took you rather than all of us, but as of now, there are no broken dishes to report._ A pause and another text appears. _Why are you so concerned about Lizzie?_

Hope throws her phone at that remark, imagining a smirk on Josie’s lips, a hand running through her hair. Josie has always been more perceptive than her sister. And right now, Hope hates her for it. She picks up the phone a second later to text Lizzie, in a breezy, off-hand, and not-at-all concerned way, then throws it on the bed again, not waiting for a reply that she was sure wouldn’t be forthcoming. 

Where the hell had all of this concern for the taller Saltzman come from? They’ve never really been friends, after all. Yes, she might have saved all of their lives by sacrificing herself and taking an extended vacation in a glorified mud bath, but her draw to Lizzie was inexplicable. But she can’t deny that it’s a draw - magnetic and charged - as if the particles within her need and crave the particles within Lizzie. As true as breathing, as true as the rising and setting of the sun, there's something special about Elizabeth Saltzman. 

Josie seems subdued, even over text, and Hope really couldn’t blame her She's still nursing the many wounds that Penelope’s absence had left, but despite that, she was stronger-willed and more likely to speak up now than before. That had to be something, right? 

Climbing into bed with a sigh and a silent prayer on her lips that they are all safe back at school, and that a particular blonde is keeping out of trouble, Hope waves her hand to turn out the lamp on her bedside table. She wakes with a start, hours later, pushing curls from her face, her heart beating rapidly and dull in her chest. Her entire body's covered in a cold sweat, her dark sleeping shirt crumpled, covers thrown astrew. Her dreams had been taken captive, invaded by dark birds flying low and in circles over her bed. They were cawing loudly. Their wings beating together, larger than normal crows. Foreboding. Eyes dark as night. Fire behind their dark irises.

She heard tell of an old legend of a girl pulled from her bed by the loud cawing of crows, her crown thrown away as she was taken down to hell. But no, this dream can’t _actually_ mean anything. The crows continue their melancholy song, as if they had broken free of her mind. Their cries echoing across the landscape. Their song spoke of a girl ripped from her bed and carried to the land of death. Death, a man, always a man. His face in shadow reigning over lost souls. Ferrying them to the next life. But she's not marked yet - her skin was white and untouched. 

Her heart's still beating and blood poured through her veins. Her lungs still work and she is whole. The dream was streaming out of her brain, tendrils of thought like mist and Hope reaches up to her forehead, her hand coming away damp. The crows continue to sing, however. As if the world hasn't stopped spinning.

Hope shakes her head to clear out the cobwebs as the door to her room bursts open. Lizzie Saltzman enters, whirling through the door like a tornado, her chest heaving. She's an ethereal vision, even now, blonde hair in disarray, her face pale. Lightning flashes behind her, illuminating her parted lips, her eyes, wide and pleading. 

“The monster,” she breathes out, and the words that follow are erased by a crash of thunder. Hope moves fast, in a blur, out of bed and onto her feet, and before she can comprehend a single moment, she has a shivering Lizzie Saltzman in her arms. Without conscious thought, her hand's raised, of its own accord, pushing a stray lock of blonde hair behind Lizzie’s ear. “What happened, Lizzie?” she asks. 

“The monster was after me,” Lizzie breathes out, “please, Hope, can you take me away from here?”

Hands reach up to cup Lizzie’s face and her eyes are wild, darting from left to right, taking in the room — the tangled sheets, the opened suitcase on the floor with one of Freya’s grimoire laying atop a pair of black lace underwear. Hope rolls her eyes at herself and feels her cheeks grow warm. But her mind is struggling to think — how the hell did Lizzie make it all the way from Mystic Falls in the middle of the night? How did she do it alone? And why the _fuck_ had Josie not told her that Lizzie was on her way? 

Lizzie shifts, closer, her body pressing against Hope, and Hope pulls her closer, almost involuntarily. She needs to asses the situation. Calm down. Focus, Mikaelson. 

“Tell me what happened,” she pleads. But Lizzie simply burrows her face into Hope’s shoulder, pale and shaking and shivering with fear. It feels like an image out of an entirely different dream, Lizzie so close to her, in Hope’s arms. Maybe that’s why she feels like this, light-headed, intoxicated, drunk on Lizzie Saltzman.

She needs to act. They could be in danger. Lizzie could be in danger. 

She tilts Lizzie’s head upwards, carefully, tenderly, until their eyes meet and Lizzie's staring up at her, eerily pliant and Hope _wants_. She wants, and she wants, and she wants to carry Lizzie away from all danger and all demons, protect her and shield her. 

“Lizzie, I need you to tell me what happened,” she insists, thinks of Josie and all the other students at the Salvatore School. They could be in danger too. 

Before Lizzie can reply, the door flies open, nearly broken off its rusted hinges, revealing Alaric, the crossbow held out in front of him at the ready. Lizzie whimpers, curls deeper into Hope, and Hope reacts, placing her body between them, shields Lizzie from her father. 

“Hope, get away —”

“You’re scaring your daughter, Alaric,” she chides, waits for him to lower the crossbow. “Don’t worry, I’ve got you,” she says to Lizzie. 

He may not be the best father, but this is too much. 

Alaric keeps the crossbow firmly raised. 

“Hope,” Alaric begins, the concern and panic in his voice making it tremble as her name falls out of his lips. He’s terrified. He’s terrified and he won’t lower the weapon. He levels the tip of the arrowhead at Lizzie’s skull and Hope feels a growl grow in her chest, instinctual and animalistic. 

“Hope, let go of it and take a few steps back.” 

His voice is measured now and he steps forward cautiously. 

“It?” Alaric had misspoken. It was the heat of the moment, the fear coursing through his veins, Hope rationalized. 

“Hope, you’re hugging a corpse.” 

“Can’t you see it?! It looks just like —” Hope’s voice breaks. Lizzie, she wants to say. It looks just like Lizzie. Because it — she — looks like Lizzie. But now she feels wrong. She smells wrong. 

This isn’t Lizzie. This isn’t her Lizzie. Lizzie, who smells like cinnamon and coffee and the rain. Not like this, not like metal and blood and nothingness. Lizzie, who fears and fights anyway, who would never ask Hope to bring her away from battle. Lizzie, who would be saying something sarcastic and not looking up at Hope, saccharine sweet. Blue eyes are inches away from her and Hope sees, and sees, and sees. This isn't Lizzie. 

It’s a trick, a deception, and she has fallen victim to it. She comes to her senses. But it's too late. She pushes, but the woman — girl — monster — is far too close to her and pushes back, and all of a sudden, there's a knife embedded in her stomach, the hilt an ornate web of steel that screams pagan. That screams old and otherworldly. 

Searing pain rushes through her, blinding, and now she can see the weapon, once again in the woman’s hand and she whispers the first spell she can think of, pain erupting in her side, and blasts the monster out of the window. 

And she needs to go after her, but instead, she finds herself on the ground. The smell of blood is strong and it’s all over her clothes and in her nose. It’s not the scent she craved, cinnamon and coffee and the rain. She lifts her head to see Alaric plucking the knife off of the ground, wrapping it in a handkerchief, before coming to her side, knees bent. Concern's etched on his face as his eyes travel from her face to the wound at her side. 

The world spins again and she hears Alaric rise, walk away from Hope, and unleashes a bolt from his weapon. A moment, a pause, then another one. A final act of vengeance on a creature whose motivations were shrouded in secrecy. The world spins off of its axis, her vision swims with darkness, and she passes out. 


	2. Chapter 2

It’s pouring rain by the time Hope makes it back to the school. She had run through the woods as her wolf while Alaric had been driving somewhere alongside her. She'd lost track of him as the road pulled away from the woods, but she could sense him nearby, could hear the low rumble of the car’s engine in the distance.

Far away and far too close. 

She had shrugged off his questions and concerns with a snarl before shifting, once she had regained consciousness. Instead, she'd used the many miles of fog and trees to throw her anger out to the sky. How could she have been so stupid? Her blind spot, her weakness, was growing larger. Humiliation burns inside her, hot and raw. 

She’s Hope Mikaelson. She should know better. She should know better than to be easily fooled by a pretty face and an earnest smile and the image and feeling of Lizzie Saltzman, in her arms. 

She hadn’t gambled on rain, but nothing else seemed to be going right tonight. Virginia’s weather was tempestuous at best, and this late in the fall, a rainstorm could turn into a flash flood in a second. And yet, there's something calming about the storms pouring down above her, unhindered and uncontrolled. She doesn’t think about the gash on her side at her hip. Knows that it will heal while she runs, but she makes it back to the school, changes into a dry pair of jeans and a sweater at the Old Mill, and promises Alaric that she’ll be fine, that she just needs some rest. 

Slowly, she walks towards the hallway, up to her room, when she finds herself dizzy and faint all over again. Her hand goes to her side and her palm comes away wet and red. Her knees shake and she collapses. Her body, betraying her by not healing, let her down again as she looks up at the person whose path she was now blocking.

She had fallen not three steps in front of a very wet, nearly naked Lizzie Saltzman, clad only in a towel. 

“Come on now, Mikaelson, you can’t be falling for me that easily.”

But the jest in her voice knits itself into concern on her face as Lizzie kneels before Hope’s form.

* * *

Hope collapses in front of her and Lizzie feels her world shatter. Very carefully, she drops to her knees in front of Hope’s body before she calls for Josie. Her hand covers Hope’s forehead and comes away wet when she removes it and her racing heart increases its tempo, beating dull and loud. Josie bursts out of their room, her hand on her chest and Lizzie knows that stupid shared twin pain look when she sees it. It makes Lizzie even more concerned. Her reaction to Hope falling was like a lightning bolt and Josie’s eyes widen she takes in the scene. 

Lizzie, in a towel. A bleeding Hope on the floor. The world around her seems blurry, focused only upon the figure of Hope Mikaelson on the ground in front of her. 

“Josie, get Dad!” Lizzie’s voice cracks and shakes and Josie takes one look at her with a brow raised before departing. Lizzie sees the blood, assesses the injury, and siphons from the floor beneath her to mutter a low healing spell over Hope’s wound, but to no avail. The skin stitches itself together before opening again and again. Lizzie siphons more and more from the floor, taking the power that flows through the school but it’s useless. She's tired and spent and Hope’s wound shines red. Hope keeps bleeding and Lizzie feels breathless, fear, concern, worry, intermingling in her chest in a dull ache. 

She doesn’t know how long it takes for her dad to arrive. It feels like hours. Hours, with Lizzie’s hand pressed over Hope’s wound, attempting to maintain pressure. Hours, in which she watches Hope’s chest rise and fall, far too slowly. Hours of waiting. 

It’s probably minutes. 

They maneuver her into the twin’s room, into Josie’s unused bed. She still wouldn’t admit to the nights she spent in Penelope’s old room, and Lizzie wasn’t going to fight her on it. Josie needed time to heal in her own way. Josie and Alaric debate and discuss and Dorian and Emma rush in and out. A flurry of motion and Lizzie's still, Hope’s hand in hers and at some point, she had gotten dressed, even though she couldn’t remember leaving Hope's side. 

She wades out of her reverie, lost for a moment as the world comes back to her, and she can still hear them discussing and debating, but all she can focus on is Hope, ghastly pale and almost unmoving. They bandage the wound, still open, still unhealing. 

“Your mother taught me this,” Alaric says, and Lizzie thinks about Josette, and about her mother, away in Europe, and wishes either of them were here. 

After a while, they disappear, one after the other. Josie and Dorian go to the library to try to find something, anything, that could explain what stabbed her, what wounds a tribrid, who they could be up against. 

A student runs in requesting Emma. Lizzie barely listens but she had moved fully onto Josie’s bed with Hope, sitting with her back against the headboard, an arm up on the wood over Hope. Protecting her. Josie comes in sometime later, face determined and whispers a slew of spells over Hope and the skin stitches itself together slowly as Lizzie looks on with wide eyes. They add a clean bandage, out of the worst of it for now. Or so they hope. 

Her father looks more uncomfortable with every passing minute and she knows that the pressures of running a school are bearing down on him. 

“Go,” she says, “I’ll stay with her." She couldn’t imagine being anywhere else, anyway. 

Time blends together as Hope lies still. One day bleeds to two. Lizzie doesn’t leave Hope’s side and the smirk that sits on Josie’s face grows by the day, but Lizzie really isn’t ready to have that conversation. Josie reminds Lizzie to shower and eat. Alaric comes in and stands awkwardly at the foot of the bed, hand at the back of his neck. Josie reminds her to take a walk, that Hope will wake up, that she _has_ to wake up. Josie also reminds her that Hope is the most powerful being in the world, but all Lizzie sees is auburn hair and a gorgeous smile. 

Landon comes by far too often for Lizzie’s liking.

She flees from the room each time, before she says something way off-base, before she calls him a hobbit or mud puddle, before she tells him that he doesn’t deserve her. 

Before she has to explain why his presence bothers her. Why she can’t stand to be in the same room as him. Why — She leaves when he comes in, and stands outside, and thinks about Hope, until the rage inside of her subsides, a little. He stays too long, but when he leaves, he shoots Lizzie a glance with a clouded look. 

Lizzie sleeps fitfully, but always, always with an arm around Hope. They really should have moved her back to her own room. Josie’s eyes are far too knowing, but they both excel at hiding things from each other when the heart is involved. 

The next morning, Lizzie takes off to the library and finds a book on magical creatures, piecing the story together from what little Alaric had told her. They think it was a shapeshifter, but that could mean anything. That could be anything. She researches kitsunes and other creatures. She combs through books for a creature who takes the forms of others, the forms of humans. She doesn’t know what or who Hope saw. Only that Alaric saw a corpse and Hope saw something else. Someone else. She’s sure it was Landon, but even that thought doesn’t sit right with her. 

She tries to forget that Alaric had said that Hope was clutching the creature, cradling it gently in her arms. The thought of Hope and Landon together is enough to make her skin crawl and her heart race. She finally settles on jinns. Learns about how they can appear in human and animal form. How they can possess and trick humans. How they exist in a grey area between angels and demons.

The jinn isn’t the most important thing though. The dagger, with its hilt of silver and steel. The dagger that wounded a tribrid and dragged her into a deep slumber. Alaric wouldn’t dare let her touch the knife, despite her pleading. He locked it somewhere in his office even her magic couldn’t find. 

She comes back to her room to find a book about Persian weapons on her bedside table, with a few guesses as to who provided it. She leaves her room later, the night after the book arrived, to run to the kitchen for a banana and finds Pedro leaving with a giant cookie in his hand and a wink. That kid knew more than all of them combined. 

She perches on the edge of the bed over the book, reading about a dagger laced with poison and sealed with a charm that could pierce even the skin of a tribrid. She learns about its origins — a knife forged centuries ago, a blood pact between a witch and a voodoo priest because, of course, all roads lead them back to New Orleans. 

Even if the roads started thousands of miles away in the cradle of civilization. None of her research leads her to a cure, however. Just questions, endless questions. 

Two days bleed to three, three to four, four seeps into six, and finally, finally Hope wakes up.


	3. Chapter 3

Lizzie's gone from the room, showering after a very pointed comment from Josie in which the siphon insinuated that perhaps Lizzie would wake Hope up with her scent alone. 

“She is a werewolf, after all, Liz. Superior sense of smell.” 

Lizzie had sent a book flying at Josie for that before her sister escaped out the door, but a quick smell of her shirt told her that Josie wasn’t wrong. 

“Gross. You better be worth this, Mikaelson. And don’t you dare wake up without me, okay?” 

She moves to kiss Hope on the forehead but stops herself because she can’t, won’t, refuses to go there, and shakes her head before disappearing to the bathroom down the hall. Hope wakes slowly, eyes adjusting to the low darkness and she realizes that she’s alone in the twin’s room. Her memories end with the monster, the rain, Lizzie. Her phone is charged next to her and the date is some six days in the future. She remembers patches of memories, tendrils of thought, and it’s hazy. She remembers warmth and soothing words. She remembers magic and Lizzie. A lot of Lizzie. A very naked, blurry Lizzie muttering spell after spell over her body on the warm wooden floor. 

Hope takes a deep breath and swallows, her legs pulled up to her chest. She looks down and she’s wearing a hoodie of Lizzie’s. Looks at her legs and she’s in too-long plaid pajamas. The clothes smell right. They smell like cinnamon and vanilla. They smell like the creature should have smelled. 

The door opens with a bang and Josie flies in, already mid-sentence and holding a book. “Liz,” Josie says, “have you seen—” before she spots Hope, interrupts herself and hurries over to the bed.

“Hey. You’re awake. How are you feeling?”

“Dizzy,” Hope decides on. It’s at least half the truth. “What happened?”

“You showed up here, like a week ago, with a stab wound and fainted. Lizzie brought you in here,” Josie enunciates her sister’s name, an eyebrow raised. 

Hope doesn’t miss the implication but chooses to ignore it.

“I didn’t heal on the run back. Why didn’t I heal on the run back?” she questions, feeling the skin on her side and how it feels tight, how it feels new. Her fingers move along a raised scar. 

Josie shrugs. “It was a bewitched dagger. Do you remember how you got stabbed?”

Hope curls her body a little more into the hoodie, a little deeper, breathes in. Lizzie. 

“There was a shape-shifting demon. It fooled me,” she doesn’t really want to elaborate, doesn’t know how to explain that she held Lizzie in her arms and got tricked. Outwitted. Josie’s eyes are on her, far too observant. 

“Was it Landon?” she asks, “did it turn into him?” Hope's taken aback by the question.” Oh shit, Hope had forgotten about him. 

“What — Landon? No.” She breathes, in and out, slowly. “Why?”

Josie shrugs, far too nonchalant. “The demon was a jinn. It commonly takes the shape of someone you care about, to trick you.”

Hope doesn’t know what to say, and before she can reply, Josie moves, her lips turning into hint of a smirk. “Lizzie should be back soon. She just went to shower.”

Hope sits up, a little more. “Lizzie was here?” And bites down on her lip, because this is Lizzie’s room. Of course she was.

Josie gets up without bothering to hide the fact that she’s rolling her eyes. “She never left your side.” Josie pauses, whirling back to Hope. “Except when Landon came by.” Hope ignites the pang in her stomach at the mention of Landon, again. Another sigh and Hope breathes in more of Lizzie, can feel her presence even now. Can feel an arm wrapped around her and a ghost of a kiss on her forehead. 

“Jo, did you use my body wash agai—? Hope!” Lizzie’s voice breaks the silence after the mention of Landon and Hope feels a weight lifted from her. Lizzie clutches her towel to her chest, in the doorway, the faintest tinge of red spreading down her body. A memory comes back to Hope, unbidden, and it makes her heart race and her stomach drop. She remembers it now. Remembers collapsing in front of Lizzie. Remembers tiny droplets of water and warm hands. 

“You really don’t like wearing clothes around me, do you?” Hope quips, if only to divert attention from her red face and the warmth tingling through her abdomen. “A girl could think this is turning into a habit for you.” 

Lizzie looks down at her body, absently, and rolls her eyes, stepping further into the room. There were far more important things to worry about than her lack of clothing. She bites back a retort, knowing she did not need to be flirting with Hope right in front of Josie. Not that she wanted to flirt with Hope at all. They were friends. Hope was her friend. She kept a watch over her day and night because that’s what friends do. 

“How are you awake?! Are you okay? None of the books said anything about you waking up but of course, you had to wake up at some poin—” 

“Clothes, Lizzie,” Josie reminds her sister, barely hiding the laughter in her voice. A hand is over Josie’s mouth and Hope really couldn’t blame her. “Not all of us want to see you in a towel.” 

Hope chose to ignore the implication that some of them do. 

“Clothes? Oh, clothes! Right! Yes.” Clutching the towel, the blonde grabs a pair of sweatpants and an old t-shirt before rushing out of the room. 

“So….” Josie begins and Hope has to clear her throat to focus on the present and not on the way Lizzie’s curves could barely be hidden by the piece of terry cloth or the number of water droplets that had escaped down her chest and into the towel. Twelve, she thinks. Not that she was looking. Or counting. 

Lizzie's thankfully back after a few moments and it really should be a sin to look that good in a t-shirt that was on backward and sweatpants two sizes too big, but somehow the blonde Saltzman made it work. Lizzie sits in the chair by her bed and Hope wants to reach out, wants the closeness and the warmth she knows she’s had by her side for days. She wants it back.

Hope doesn’t answer any of the rapid-fire questions Lizzie had thrown her way moments before. Doesn’t do anything but watch the blonde and think about flashes of memory and dreams. Dreams of yellow hair and blue eyes and a bed that was almost too small for the two of them. 

It’s awkward now. Lizzie's gazing at her with a smile, waiting for the full story, and Hope, Hope can’t bring herself to give words to her moment of weakness. To begin explaining what happened. To begin accepting what it means. 

“I should go,” she says, desperately trying not to let her reticence show. “Landon will want — I should—” the excuse is out of her mouth too quickly and she can see the way Lizzie feels its sting. 

The statement hurts them both but somehow the pain is even more acute when Lizzie sighs at her and says, “He came by to check on you every day. It was both romantic and revolting at the same time.” 

“Yeah, he’s, uh, dependable like that,” Hope chokes out. 

It’s too warm in here, in Lizzie’s sweater, in her clothes, in her bed, in her room, surrounded by her. The smile on Lizzie’s face is forced, and it breaks something inside of Hope, to see Lizzie acting, trying, pretending to be happy for her. 

“I really should go see Landon,” Hope says, stumbling out of the room with a smile, biting her lip to hold back tears. She storms out and nothing but a far too empty silence remains. 

“Do you want to—” Josie attempts, but Lizzie shakes her head. No. No. No. There’s nothing to say. Josie buries her head in a book not long after. Lizzie turns over in bed, away from Josie, away from the imprint Hope had left after days, away from the scent lingering on her pillow. Josie turns out the light and Lizzie stays awake, eyes open and staring into the darkness.

* * *

The floorboards creak in front of their room hours later as the door opens slowly. Moonlight spills across the floor and Hope is gorgeous, dazzling even in the darkness. Lizzie sits up, sees Hope, and feels her heart catch in her throat. She says nothing as she gets into bed. Lizzie wants to ask her why, ask her about Landon, but as Hope curls into her side, her words are lost. 

She wakes in the morning, her head buried in Hope’s neck and her arm slung across her stomach. Josie’s bed is empty and made and as she sits up in bed, Hope wakes up too. They don’t talk about it. Even Josie spares them knowing commentary. 

This happens again the next night and each night after for a week. They never talk about it and Lizzie decides that maybe she doesn’t need to figure it all out, especially if it means that Hope is safe in her bed each night. Maybe she doesn’t need an explanation if it means losing Hope’s presence in her mind and in her bed. Maybe the visible evidence of Hope being alive, well, and safe is enough. It’s enough without talk of words or feelings. It has to be enough, right? 

Late one night, two weeks after the jinn attack and eight days after Hope had woken up, Lizzie’s up late, researching the dagger when she hears the floorboards creak again and knows that moments later, her door will slowly crack open. She tosses the book on her bedside table and runs a hand through her hair before holding up the comforter as Hope climbs in. Josie had chosen tonight to escape to Penelope’s old room, and suddenly, all the questions that Lizzie hasn’t been asking feel pressing. 

“Not that I’m not enjoying our sleepovers but shouldn’t we maybe —?” 

“I don’t want to talk about it,” Hope cuts her off, flicking her hand to douse the light. 

She's dressed in shorts and an oversized t-shirt, the neck of the shirt showing off her shoulder and the crescent moon that always shone so bright. 

“Clearly,” Lizzie can’t help but roll her eyes at Hope. The strong silent act has gone on a bit too long. 

She pauses, takes a breath, and utters the words that had been echoing in her mind since Hope had regained consciousness. 

“Is Lando—” Lizzie begins as Hope curls into her side, facing her, the light from outside keeping her face half in shadow and Lizzie never thought Hope would willingly be the little spoon but the precedent was telling. 

“Can we not, please?” Hope closes her eyes slowly before laying on her back, face upturned towards the ceiling. She tries to hide the pain that strikes across her chest at the mention of Landon but knows Lizzie sees far too much of her emotions. She isn’t sure that is a good thing. 

Lizzie looks at her, her face softening and so many questions fly forward again, but she nods and settles on her side. Hope turns over, her back to Lizzie, and the blonde sighs and pulls the tribrid closer to her, her head buried in the back of Hope’s neck, her arm tight around her waist. Lizzie falls asleep thinking of daggers and curses and vanilla and Hope. 

The scream that wakes Lizzie up is entirely too close and entirely too wrenching.


	4. Chapter 4

The scream that wakes Lizzie up is entirely too close and entirely too wrenching. Hope's thrashing in the sheets, a cold sweat on her body as whimpers crack through the silence. 

“Hey, hey, shush. It’s okay, Hope!” Lizzie pulls her into her arms as Hope comes to, kissing her forehead in an effort to calm the girl. “You’re here and you’re safe, Hope. I’ve got you.” 

_I’ve got you. I’ve got you._

The words echo through Hope’s mind and she sees Lizzie, cold and wet, smells blood and iron, and feels the weight of Lizzie’s corpse in her arms once more. 

“Nightmare?” Lizzie asks as Hope’s breathing slows, but Hope doesn’t reply, only looks at her, looks at her with an expression both questioning and pleading as she places a hand on Lizzie’s cheek. 

Her eyes dance across Lizzie’s face and the blonde really had never taken a moment to appreciate the flecks of brown in Hope’s brilliantly blue eyes. Now, she can’t look away. Lizzie feels her heart speed up and she isn’t sure who moves first, only that they come together, slowly, tentatively, lips exploring and memorizing, and then quickly. 

Nothing could have prepared Lizzie for this. Kissing Hope Mikaelson is like falling without the fear of the impact. It’s like flying, high above the clouds with the sun on her face. It is like magic flowing through her fingers. It feels like coming home. Hope kisses like she fights, with a passion and the hunger of a wolf. She takes control and Lizzie wants to drink Hope in and capture this feeling.

Her tongue slips into Lizzie’s mouth and they share one breath, breaking only to breathe before their heavy-lidded eyes make contact again. Lizzie tries to flip Hope but the tribrid is obnoxiously stubborn in all things, so why would making out be any different? A laugh is shared between the two as Lizzie runs her hands through Hope’s hair, tucking a stray lock behind her ear. She wants to tell Hope she’s beautiful. She wants to tell her a lot of things. She wants and she wants and she wants. And so she takes. 

Their clothes are shed in a pile on the floor next to them as the sun's breaking over the horizon and Lizzie knows better than to ask any questions, lest the spell be broken and Hope runs. She’s always been so terribly, terribly good at running. 

Hope thinks fleetingly about soft spots, about weaknesses, but she thinks that if there is anyone she would want to break over, it would be Lizzie Saltzman, time and time again. She knows this now. Had shied away from it days before but everything had been leading to this moment and she was tired, so tired of running from fate. 

Hope’s holding onto Lizzie like she is her lifeline and Lizzie finds herself backed against the headboard, Hope hovering somewhere above her, inches away and unbearably far. They’re seated, Hope in her lap and her hands cup Lizzie’s face and she sends kisses down Lizzie’s neck and behind her ear and who knew that spot would send chills down Lizzie’s body and to her core? Lizzie responds with a moan in Hope’s ear that earns a playful growl from Hope, Lizzie’s hands scratching down Hope’s back. 

Hope bites at Lizzie’s pulse point, earning another moan from Lizzie. Heat's rising from a spot in her stomach, and Hope astride her is thoroughly unhelpful, and Lizzie gasps out, “Hope…”

Hope moves down her body now and Lizzie feels herself sink lower into the pillows as kisses dot her chest, her stomach, her hips, her thighs. Hope bites her hip bone and Lizzie wants more, more kisses, more bites, more teasing, more Hope. It isn’t until she’s pulled forward, Hope grasping the back of her thighs to slowly, painstakingly kiss a trail up her calf to her center that Lizzie realizes she needs this girl more than breathing. Realizes she is completely naked in bed with Hope Mikaelson and this somehow feels too fast and years in the making. 

All rational thought escapes her brain as Hope licks through her center and fuck, girls really are so much better at this than boys. The moan that escapes her mouth is loud, far too loud, but somehow she can’t bring herself to care, not when Hope is kneeling between her legs, her red hair a halo around her head in the wan morning light and god, she's so fucking beautiful.

Her fingers tighten around the sheets, gripping the material. Another lick and Lizzie's squirming now, and Hope stops, pulling a hand that had been holding onto Lizzie’s hip to keep her still to run through her now thoroughly-tousled hair. Lizzie makes another noise, a plea or a prayer, Hope isn’t sure. But she watches the blonde’s chest rise and fall rapidly, waiting silently. 

This is sex but it’s also a new beginning and an ending. A willful choice to ignore the signs screaming no, to give in if only just this once. Hope isn’t sure she will ever be the same again after this. That anything will ever be the same. Lizzie's important, more important than a quick fuck. More important than anything. This is different. This is better, this is special. 

She moves her lips lower now, kissing Lizzie’s pubic bone before another breathy moan shakes Lizzie’s body. She leans in, licking in a long line up and down, and Lizzie arches closer towards her, another moan falling from her lips. Hope traces patterns with her tongue and glides her hands over Lizzie’s thigh, takes in the soft skin and the way Lizzie moves against her before she slips one, and after a moment, another finger inside of Lizzie. She's met with an " _oh my god"_ and should ask if this is okay, if this is too much.

But as she moves her hand in and out and pauses to check, Lizzie exhales to the ceiling and breathes, " _don’t you dare stop.”_

And she doesn’t. She doesn’t stop until she feels the wave of euphoria building in Lizzie, until she hears her breathing change, until the moans build and build and Hope really should have cast a cloaking spell but she’s enjoying the sounds of Elizabeth Saltzman coming undone underneath her touch far, far too much. She doesn’t stop until Lizzie's clenching around her fingers and her breathing crescendos and falls. 

She stops only when Lizzie’s hand, which had somehow found its way to the top of Hope’s head in an attempt to pull the tribrid more fully into her, to more easily grind against her tongue, lightly pushes Hope away to collapse on the bed, chest slick with sweat and heaving. 

Hope takes another lick after she pulls her fingers out, and another as Lizzie writhes under the sensitivity, but the blonde seems powerless to stop her. She can’t help the smile that crosses her face as she presses a kiss to Lizzie’s thigh. This is something she could get used to far too easily. Being drunk on Lizzie Saltzman was as intoxicating as it was dangerous.

She kisses her way back along Lizzie’s thighs, up her stomach, until Lizzie pulls her upwards until they’re close enough to kiss again. Hope kisses her and Lizzie feels breathless, still coming down from her orgasm. She loses herself in the kisses, in Hope’s lips, gentle and soft against her, tasting herself on Hope's lips, and she doesn’t even notice what she’s doing until she feels magic coursing through her body.

Far too much magic. She breaks away, intent on apologizing. “I’m sorry,” she begins, but Hope silences further apologies with the gentle press of a finger against her lips. 

“I liked it,” she says. Her voice sounds different, a little rougher, a little rawer, and she’s looking down at Lizzie, her eyes darker than usual. It’s all the permission Lizzie needs. 

She settles her hands on Hope’s hips, pulling her impossibly closer, before she flips them. This time, Hope lets her. 

Lizzie hovers over her, letting her eyes linger on Hope’s features, breathtakingly gorgeous before she slowly bends down to kiss Hope, before she begins siphoning. Power flows through her as she kisses her. Knows that she can take as much as she likes without weakening Hope. Knows that this connection, this spell, is their own kind of magic. Ancient and instinctual, but magic nonetheless from a girl too strong, who fears being weak, to a girl who takes but only if offered. The electricity sparks around them and Lizzie's buzzing with need and want and hunger for Hope.

She traces the lines of Hope’s body with her hands, learns the way Hope’s breathing accelerates when she trails kisses down her neck, the way she gasps Lizzie’s name when she grazes her teeth over Hope’s nipple, cupping her breasts in her hands. 

She wants to, she needs to, commit every single inch of Hope’s body to memory, and she moves her lips over the exposed skin, kissing, sucking, leaving marks that will be gone by morning. But for tonight, Hope is here, and Lizzie can’t help but marvel at every birthmark, every freckle, every atom that makes up Hope Mikaelson. 

Hope’s body feels taut underneath her touch, powerful, and Lizzie thinks that she never wants this moment, this night, to end. She slips lower down the bed, stops at the scar that is still marking Hope’s body, inches above her hip, a lasting reminder of the dagger wound she received. But Hope is alive, Hope is well, Hope is here. 

Lizzie sucks on soft skin above Hope’s hip, beneath the scar, and Hope groans, “Liz,” slipping out from her lips and Lizzie needs, needs, needs to hear Hope say her name like that again. She moves lower and circles Hope’s clit with her tongue and Hope’s body curves upwards, her head thrown back, her hair splayed out across the pillows. Hope's warm and soft underneath her touch, and Lizzie feels addicted to the way she tastes, addicted to how she arches impossibly closer when Lizzie moves her tongue inside of her, addicted to the way she gasps when Lizzie draws patterns over her. 

She has her hand on Hope’s hip, and Hope reaches down and tangles their fingers together, and Lizzie looks up for a second, to meet Hope’s gaze, warm, and soft, and entirely focused on Lizzie. Hope may be the artist, but Lizzie could paint those eyes from memory alone. Lizzie switches between broad stroke and fast circles, one hand firmly intertwined with Hope’s, the other on the soft skin of Hope’s thigh. Hope’s breathing quickens and her grasp on Lizzie’s hand tightens and Lizzie thinks that she never wants this moment to end. “Fuck,” falls from Hope’s lips, “fuck, baby,” and Lizzie quickens her movements and feels Hope’s body rock against her. 

She doesn’t let go of Hope’s hand during the shudders of Hope’s orgasm, lingers between Hope’s legs, leaving soft kisses, until Hope sits up, a smile on her face that has Lizzie’s heart doing _things_ and tugs on her hand. “Come here,” she requests, her voice low and lazy.

Lizzie wakes and they are wrapped in each other. Impossibly close and the blonde can’t help but trace lines from the pillow on Hope’s cheek. Hope’s eyes are closed but Lizzie knows she’s awake, thinks maybe she is also trying to memorize this moment. This feeling. Lizzie's mind flashes to an immortal boy with curly hair and her heart sinks. Last night with Hope, being with Hope, was far too good to be true and this surely was all a dream.

But she feels solid and warm beneath Lizzie’s fingers, had felt real last night and early this morning. And yet, this isn’t real, she reminds herself, as awareness starts setting in, as the rest of her sleepiness disappears, and suddenly, Hope’s hold on her feels constricting, far too tight, because none of this is actually real. And Lizzie can’t remain here, can’t indulge in this illusion for any longer, can’t keep hoping that Hope wants her back. 

A kiss to Hope’s temple because this was doomed from the start and Lizzie flees from the room, taking a pile of clothes with her. 


	5. Chapter 5

Hope gives her five minutes, ten minutes. Ten minutes of staring at the ceiling in the room Lizzie and Josie had shared since before Hope had come to Salvatore. The room had always seemed like Lizzie and Josie’s space, their sanctuary. A sacred haven for the twins that was off-limits to the girl with no family. After waking up here, in Lizzie’s arms, it felt a bit more like home, but maybe that was just the warmth around them. 

With a sigh, Hope dresses quickly, knowing where Lizzie had run off to, knowing she would find the blonde at the Old Mill. She was far too predictable. Josie walks in when she’s pulling a sweater, not her own, over her head, takes in the room and Hope’s disheveled state with a raised eyebrow. She says nothing about the now-fading marks on Hope’s neck, nothing about the sheets kicked to the floor. 

“Dad wants to leave after breakfast. Dorian found something.”

Hope nods, absentmindedly. “Yeah, no, sure. Uh, I’ve got to go, Jo, I’ll see you in a bit.”

Josie’s voice stops her when she’s almost reached the door. “Hope.”

Hope looks over her shoulder. “Yes?”

“Don’t screw it up. And maybe watch out for anything flying at your head.”

As she predicted, she finds Lizzie inside the Old Mill. Hope approaches cautiously and Lizzie sniffs from the ratty old couch, running a finger underneath her eye to catch stray tears, her knees pulled up to her chest. 

“You ran. Very loudly, even for someone with super hearing, but you still ran,” she begins, testing the waters. 

“I was saving you the awkward conversation about how last night was a mistake, how it should never have happened.” Lizzie looks up from the couch, lashes sparkling, and Hope joins her. They maintain their distance, even if Hope wants to reach out and wipe away every tear that had fallen from Lizzie’s eyes. 

She was gorgeous, even now. She always had been. 

“Funny. I thought you were going to hit me with that same argument this morning,” Hope laughs but it lacks any real joy and she glances up to catch Lizzie’s eyes, unsure. Unsure even after everything they shared together just hours before. 

“Landon —” Lizzie begins, her voice cracking. 

“Isn’t my boyfriend,” Hope finishes, a smile on her face that is forced. 

She gets it now. A bite to her lip and this really wasn’t how things were supposed to go. She curses herself, her own stubbornness, her cautiousness, her fear. She really should have been honest from the start but giving voice to this, to them, her feelings seemed monumental. She would choose Malivore over talking to Lizzie about her own feelings, about the way Lizzie makes her feel far weaker than she is allowed to be. 

“I broke up with Landon the night I woke up,” Hope admits. It had been remarkably amicable because Landon was a remarkably amicable guy. He’d stopped her as she turned away and asked, “It’s about Lizzie, isn’t it?” His perceptiveness had surprised her, but clearly, she had been the only one with blinders on all along. 

“You didn’t care to share any of this with me?” Lizzie isn’t sad anymore. She’s furious, the righteous anger igniting like a wildfire within her, and Hope was surely going to feel the burn. Collateral damage, like a bomb going off, the shrapnel digging deep. Around them, the old structure shakes precariously and Hope remembers, quite clearly, suddenly, just how much magic, how much power, Lizzie carries within her after last night. 

“You thought you could just climb into my bed each night with no questions asked? Didn’t you think I would want to know!?” 

“Why, Lizzie? Why would you want to know about it? You jump from boy to boy faster than Josie can set a fire.” Hope was grasping at anything now, any dig she could take at Lizzie to save herself from explaining everything.

The mill shakes again and knows that both she and Lizzie are walking a tightrope.

“You aren’t any boy, Hope. You aren’t just anyone. What don’t you get?! I stayed by your side day and night while you were unconscious. I researched everything about the jinn and the dagger, I— ”

Hope is up and off the couch and this conversation is too raw, too real to have so close to Lizzie. She turns and strides away, arms crossed and head hung low. 

“The jinn was you,” she states simply, her back to Lizzie. “The jinn was you and you were in my arms and then I realized it wasn’t you. Realized your dad saw me holding a corpse when all I could see was you. I was blinded by you, a weak spot and I got injured because of it and we still don’t know why.” She turns now and Lizzie is speechless, gazing at her in stunned silence.

“And what if it’s not me all alone next time? What if next time I get distracted, I put your dad in danger? Or Josie? Or you?” Her voice almost breaks at the last word and she curses herself for it, silently.“I thought — I thought that keeping you safe and at arm’s length was the right thing. That any potential harm would come for me and me only, but every night I dreamed of holding you again and couldn’t sleep properly until I was close to you.”

Lizzie’s expression softens, slightly. 

“I should have told you sooner, about Landon, about all of this,” Hope continues. “I couldn’t stay away from you after the attack. And after last night, well, this morning, I guess, I don’t want to anymore.”

Lizzie's standing down now, her hands wringing together for want to touch Hope but they were both too dangerous when vulnerable. 

“That’s stupid, Mikaelson,” she says, and her voice sounds gentle.“You don’t have to play the hero with me, Hope. We’re stronger together. We always have been.” Lizzie steps towards Hope. “I’ve got you,” she says, a repeat of last night, confidence and maybe a bit of magic flowing through her veins, the height difference working in her favor as she leans down to capture Hope’s lips with her own. 

Hope surrenders to the kiss, surrender to it all and the world seems to slow around them as they kiss, soft and playful but full of the promise of _something_. 

The mill shakes again and Hope opens her eyes to vines blooming, wild and beautiful all around her. Her magic, Lizzie’s magic, everything they feel and share manifesting in bloom and Hope can scarcely believe her eyes. 

“So what now?” Lizzie asks, forehead against Hope’s and a smile on her face. 

“Breakfast? And maybe covering up the hickeys on your neck, ” Hope laughs. “I would apologize, but I’m really not sorry.” 

They shower together, getting lost in each other once more, only turning off the water when it loses its heat.

* * *

They join Josie at her table in the dining hall and she just looks at them, then at Lizzie’s neck, and Lizzie swears the concealing charm had actually worked when she checked in the mirror, but clearly not as well as she thought. 

“It’s about time,” Josie says, before returning to her yogurt and granola. 

Landon looks at them from across the hall, seated between Raf and MG and Hope averts her eyes, but a hand to her thigh brings her back to center, brings her back to Lizzie. He was hurt, she could see it plain across his face, but Lizzie reaches for her hand under the table, squeezing it, and Hope can’t help but feel her heart soar at the gesture. 

Alaric makes the decision to bring Josie and Lizzie along with them to New Orleans, where he thinks their next clues lie. They proved themselves when the school was under attack those many months ago. Lizzie found the jinn, found the source of the dagger. Found all of the puzzle pieces and traced it back to Hope’s first home. 

She hopes she isn’t leading them all to their deaths and she wishes she could protect them from all of this. Wishes she could cast a protective spell to keep Lizzie and Josie and the rest of the school safe. But Mikaelsons never ran, never hid, and never backed away from a fight when someone they loved could be in danger. Especially when they themselves could be the source of that danger. Call it a martyr's complex, but Hope knew she needed to be the one to battle the jinn head-on. The trick was finding the right moment, and finding the creature alone. 

They don’t talk about the bullet wound that almost blinked Josie out of existence. They don’t talk about the time that Hope spent in Malivore. They don’t talk about the week that she spent asleep in Lizzie’s bed. Everyone carried their scars in different ways. Hope had returned from Malivore unchanged, even if the brightness in her eyes had dimmed somewhat. Her reticence to talk about it is nothing new and things seem to go back to as normal as is humanly possible at the Salvatore School. 

Alaric lets Josie sit shotgun, memories of their last road trip with the mummy fresh in his mind. Hope’s head falls on Lizzie’s shoulder three hours into the drive and Lizzie starts but eventually sinks into the feeling. Josie turns around in her seat and gives Lizzie a look that the blonde tries to shrug off. They really don’t need to have _that_ conversation now or ever, if Lizzie’s being honest. Hope’s hand moves to grip Lizzie’s arm, her fingers running down her wrist where she captures Lizzie’s hand in hers, entwining their fingers, eyes firmly closed as if she had done this a thousand times. The blonde glances upward at the SUV’s ceiling, inhaling deeply if only to get her bearings, her senses overwhelmed because _this_ , whatever Hope was doing, was new, uncharted territory. Because maybe they were sleeping together and maybe that was it. But maybe it was actually something more. 

She leans her head on the top of Hope’s and instantly wishes she hadn’t. The brunette smells like vanilla and jasmine and bad decisions and she is so damn _warm._ Lizzie can’t seem to hide the smile that breaks out across her face as she closes her eyes, their hands on her thigh. Josie turns around again to say something, but stops herself, closing her mouth quickly and facing forward with an eye roll. 

The trip south passes quickly, even if they stop at least three times for snack and bathroom breaks. It’s different, being back here, in a childhood home that fate her denied for most of it. Hope inhales the sweet air of New Orleans and nostalgia washes over her. It was far too late at night when they arrived and in the busy bustle of research and asking around for scraps of information, she didn’t really have the time to reminisce. Even the small moment now isn’t enough. But the house is silent, for once. 

Josie and Alaric are asleep in the downstairs bedrooms and Lizzie is resting peacefully in Hope‘s old room. She should go and join the blonde, if only for a few hours. Even with the thought of Lizzie and a warm bed, sleep seems to evade her, leaving Hope standing on the second-floor balcony, looking down at the atrium, and lost in a memory. And despite the brief moments she had here, with her family, the memories still linger. They last like an imprint. They were happy here, she recalls, sometimes, between the danger and the turmoil and the fights. Somewhere in between the loss and the distance, they were a family here. 

Now, the house seems empty — Freya and Keelin traveling, Marcel and Rebekah in New York, Kol and Davina God knows where. And her parents and Elijah, gone. She looks down the stairs towards the atrium when she hears steps behind her. 

“You weren’t in bed,” Lizzie says, and Hope turns around. 

She’s wearing a robe that Hope is pretty sure actually belongs to her, and said robe is much, much too short on Lizzie. Who has really nice legs. Mostly visible legs because the robe barely hits mid-thigh. 

“Is it weird,” Lizzie asks, looking around, “being back here?”

There’s something comforting about the brash directness of Lizzie’s question. It’s one of the things she lo— likes. Likes. Likes about Lizzie. She likes Lizzie. She likes the way she can trust her to say what’s on her mind. 

“Kind of,” she admits.

Lizzie doesn’t offer up empty words or promises. “Tell me about them.”

They move almost in sync. Lizzie stands behind her, head resting on her shoulder as her arms wrap around Hope, and Hope is able to tell her story, eyes gazing out at the atrium. She doesn’t have to look Lizzie in the eye and it helps. She fears she could get lost in those eyes too easily and talking about her family is important. It’s comforting and cathartic. So Hope tells her. Tells her about her family who fought the world and each other, and who fought for her, so, so hard. Always and forever. 

Minutes pass until Hope pulls away from her a little, turning to face Lizzie, the shadows that hung around her while telling the story slowly dispersing, like cobwebs in the wind. Lizzie hadn't said much, had listened and nodded and her heartbeat at Hope's back gave her more comfort than she could ever voice aloud. Her hands now find their way to the robe, lingering on the fabric of the ties at Lizzie’s waist, her back leaning against the banister. 

“Isn’t this mine?” It was definitely hers. 

“You want it back, Mikaelson? Finder's keepers,” Lizzie raises an eyebrow and laughs and Hope feels lighter. 

“Well it's mine, after all, Saltzman,” Hope replies and watches as Lizzie disappears to the other end of the hallway. 

“Come get it, then.” She twirls the tie in the air, mostly in jest but also in a way that makes Hope weak in the knees. 

And as Hope follows Lizzie back to her room, the house feels almost alive again, filled with laughter and the best kind of memories.

**Author's Note:**

> in an effort to always try to make our work better, alex is going through and splitting this into chapters and editing for content/clarity because whoa, a year went by fast! 
> 
> come say hi to us @blckmaqic or @liz__mikaelson on twitter or tell us what you thought in the comments!


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